This is mostly from memory, with the aid of any notes of my own. While I have tried to present as factual, neutral and balanced a portrayal as possible, I'm sure people will disagree with my assessments in ... well, many places!

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2.2

Political Backdrop:The coalitions of the previous round slimmed with the new round. Silver Horde, Aerodyne and House Harkonnen formed a tripartite alliance, but mostly alliances would pair up. KAOS sided with STS, HOLY and Phoenix would once more fly alongside each other. Renegades worked alongside Fury from the start of the round. Shinsen Gumi disbanded at the end of 2.1 and their pilots mostly went to the newly formed Discordia, who were allied with GTG. New alliance XF was formed from three Polish alliances, AB, ZP and IKF. They paired up with Unbroken Fellowship and Dynasty Raiders, the latter rebranded from Hakai Ouchu. A new alliance eXiles formed from old players, mainly playing under new names.

Gameplay Changes:With the flaws in the 2.1 gameplay more apparant, significant changes were made for 2.2. The impact of levels was reduced as they now only gave a +1 advantage for each level. The level curve was reworked and made significantly steeper. Port levels were rescaled from 5-30. Maneuver and AI were both reworked, and Damage Amplifiers were added to combat AI. Initiative was entirely reworked, with maneuver the only ship upgrade to count towards them. Ports and planets would now always fire first. Planets also were significantly reworked; the drone hangar cost was increased, meaning fewer drones, but the shields were increased tenfold. The galaxy map was entirely reworked into the 27-system design.

Early Round:The new galaxy map resulted in early sparring for position. KAOS and STS claimed the Zane (17) system, Lords of Fear settled in the southern systems. After an initial battle with HOLY, Fury and Renegades took as their home the new Antalon (23) system. In what would become one of the long-running battles of the round, Legion and Cartel started in Dathkara (19) near XF, UF and DR. SH, Aerodyne and HH settled in Tulven (32) and 33k, while Phoenix renewed their affection for the Chronos (13) system. The early round was noted for a succession of jumps, particulary from FUry and Renegades.

Apart from the typical system ownership battles, there were also political developments. Newcomers Fear Factory joined up with Fury and Renegades in the cumbersomely named FFuRensY alliance. Aerodyne suffered early issues and disbanded not long into the round. No successor alliance was formed. The 'outlying' HH alliances, House Corrino (HC) and the related Carpe Cerivesi (CC) formed together with SH more closely - the coalition was dubbed SHHCC.

The Sequel: SH vs Fury:The first developed war of the round was, predictably, between SH and Fury, alongside their new allies. Resentment still simmered from the last round, and it didn't take much to prompt this to develop. A planet was owned by a Fury member who left the alliance and sold it to SH. Fury reclaimed the planet, and this became a pretext for war.

The Conspiracy Jump:As alliances' raid teams started to get into full gear, the problem was fighting off increasingly efficient jump teams. The most memorable event, however, was a raid that was jumped not once, but twice. As SHHCC raided in 30k, the FFuRensY group lined up to jump - the battle was mostly even, but the jumpers withdrew after a prolonged fight. Almost immediately, GTG and Discordia followed up by jumping into the raid as well. The effect of the twin jumps was decisive and most of the SHHCC side ended the battle in pods. This was the cue for a long series of conspiracy theories about the two working together against SH.

Two Sides Form:The war between SHHCC and FFuRensY gradually expanded as the latter side began to get the upper hand. Both Phoenix and HOLY were also sucked into the war as it expanded north. One of the biggest moments of the war was a siege of a Fear Factory-owned planet in Meras (11). Despite taking 756 shots from the combined raid teams of five alliances, the planet held due to a strong restocking effort. The war dragged on for the round, although FFuRensY gradually began to push their opponents further back and had the upper hand throughout.

Tougher Nuts to Crack:Raiding the strengthened planets proved much more difficult than in previous rounds. This was true not only in the wars between the larger powers, but also when bigger alliances tried to perform the traditional act of capturing planets from smaller alliances. Two examples that stood out were Awakening Dreams' lone planet in Peridon (25), which withstood two sieges from Lords of Fear, and Star Wolves' planet in Magmus (16) which was a thorn in the side of Imperials but did eventually fall near the end of the round. The most notorious planet throughout the round was the Legion-owned Hell.

LoF vs KAOSTS:Midway through the round KAOS and STS took an interest in fighting Lords of Fear. KAOS hunters had operated in LoF territory with impunity, but this war never really caught fire. KAOSTS never fielded raiders in great strength or mounted great attacks, and Lords of Fear never took real interest in the battle. It was persistent targetting more than could be called a battle, let alone a war. One planet raid attempt by KAOSTS (using AD's raid team) ended before it began when the shipping crossed with the start of an SH op, and the cover was lost.

Battle for Hell:The battle for control of the Dathkara system between Legion and Cartel on the one side and XF, UF and DR on the other had continued all round. With the strength of planets each found it hard to evict the other; raid attempts failed in both directions. XF, UF and DR began to get the upper hand but were frustrated in their inability to take the last planet, Legion's Hell. After many attempts, this eventually fell not long before the end of the round. It yielded an immense 74 ships to the attackers, the biggest evictee tally in TDZK history.

Late Round:GTG and Discordia moved from a relatively quiet round late on to take an eXiles planet in Elanna, netting some high profile casualties as a result. Imperials were finally successful in their efforts to take the Star Wolves planet. As the SHHCC + HOLY/TPX vs FFuRensY war ran down, several players left HOLY to form a new alliance, Pods'R'Us and focused on Nexus hunting.

Individual Achievements:As groups and raid teams dominated the headlines of the round, there were fewer individual achievements of note. louisn again stood out, heading the kills ranking and still finding the time to level to a place in the top ten.

Tactical Notes:The 2.2 round marked an adjustment to the new game structure, and the emphasis on groups became increasingly marked. Jumps were more frequent and more efficient. The challenge was for raid teams getting to grips with the new difficulties, particularly planets. AI raiders were now the most survivable option, which was difficult against planets overloaded with EMP turrets.

The importance in levels was significantly reduced and the focus on levels was lessened too. Less trading also resulted in typically cheaper ship designs than were seen in the previous round. Warship design tended more towards offense and defense with the removal of speed from the initiative equation. Bubbles were much more favoured and much more successful as group combat became more standardised.

Round Summary:Punctuated by infrequent wars, the only significant conflict was the round-long battle between Fury, Renegades and Fear Factory and the increasingly growing coalition on the other side. Planets were very challenging to take, and while this benefited smaller alliances and prolonged wars, it also made some wars a little pointless.

To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself.- Albert Einstein

As a note, this is the round I can probably remember least about. I've a nagging feeling it's because there was little to remember as a stand-out event, at least, although I recall the round as a whole being quite busy. I also took a less direct interest myself. I think that most of the round was taken with cleaning up home systems and that conquests took so long, they rarely happened. However, I'm not convinced enough of this to be certain.

Anyone who can fill in the gaps, particularly as to what was happening besides with that main conflict, it would be appreciated.

Also, as a round-relevant aside because it was nowhere near worth putting in the main body, I found a few logs recently which reminded me that during the LoF vs KAOSTS "war", almost all of the STS raiders hid on the lone AD planet. I had forgotten entirely about that.

To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself.- Albert Einstein

2.2 was the round we lost Blah to Legion... I'm guessing very few people outside of Fury are aware of who Blah was, but basically Blah was pure awesome. He was the brains behind Hell, and given what he had to work with, he didn't do a bad job with Legion. Vegetto (Blah's friend in Legion that made the alliance) was a bit out there though... I think midway through the round he essentially melted down and accused Fury of having plans for "Legion's system" when we really didn't care. Blah ended up coming back to Fury in 2.3 (he had said he would if Legion didn't work out ), and served a repair carrier for pretty much the rest of his TDZK career (and a really, really good one). A few rounds later, Vegetto sent a global? to Fury where he was basically Myre on painkillers after his wisdom teeth were removed- I felt kind of bad for him, because he blamed us for Legion's failures, when we had nothing to do with it.

I tried to look back in my logs and figure out who actually sold our planet to SH- I didn't even remember this, but it sounded familiar. I couldn't find anything on it.

Something else- TPx was kind of involved in the war, in that they were harboring SH/HC ships on their main planet. This inspired most of Fury's leaders to get into Ftorp seppuku ships of great justice. It was the most fun I had in a single TDZK event ever. And we were greeted with this message...

"Planet is almost done !!! Good work and thanks to all who have helped. And big thanks goes out to Sky who have paid for loads of stuff

now this is the final design on the planet..

160 missile turrets25 Rocket Turrets85 emp turrets

150 drone hangers

Golmazh The Terer

vaves to all SH "

I suppose all the vehement denial in the world can only get you so far...

Unless I'm thinking of two entirely different events, the "conspiracy jump" section isn't accurate. The major battle that occured in the Fury/FF/Rens vs kitchen sink war and that also involved GTG/Discordia was on a kitchen sink raid in 23k. GTG/Discordia and Fury/Rens actually did jump together because both sides were hoping to jump but the kitchen sink had too many escorts for either to manage alone, but the coordination was done impromptu and it was just a one time thing; the conspiracy theories tended to focus on GTG/Discordia and Fury/FF/Rens supposedly working together during the rest of the war, which wasn't the case.

As for the jump itself, GTG/Discordia accidently triggered on us anyway, which contributed to the jump actually being very much in the kitchen sink's favor.

As I said, my memory of this round was wonderfully hazy, and that particularly applied to everything going on in the kitchen sink war. I knew HOLY and Phoenix were involved, although I should have mentioned it more prominently than a little footnote. Solace's account of the jump is almost certainly more accurate than my own, I mostly made up most of the details as a placeholder from memory alone. I only remembered of it from finding a question in my Quiz of the Year about it, which asked who was the biggest conspiracy theorist (the answer was, of course, Exar).

I think I'll probably try and rewrite that a little more. If anyone else has some information on it, please let me know. I am trying to update the main bodies of all my history texts as I get better information on what happened from people with better memories or greater proximity than I had.

By the way, zer0das, the same source (my Quiz of the Year records) also provides the pilot name of who sold the planet, it was live-or-die who was in Fury, swapped to Legion, and then sold it to SH. The Quiz also is my source for the number of shots on the FF planet.

To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself.- Albert Einstein

I don't think the OP quite does justice to how ri-goddamned-diculous armor integrity was that round. A primary weapon-based 245/250 ship with 36 speed and enough munitions to one-hit a freighter could, and did, wreck pretty much anything in a duel that wasn't EMP-based. People didn't really abuse DAmps as much as they maybe should've.

I don't recall if it was a mechanical change, or people just learned how to combat it, but AI was nowhere near as effective after the end of 2.2.

Wow, the fact that you remember all this astonishes me. I can barely remember how the game used to work apart from clicking examine and hitting the attack button.Reading through the history made me remember many things though. How long ago was this.. it must have been at least 6 years. I remember quitting TDZK and later on moving to WoW, with plenty of people from TDZK at least. And WoW has been out for a good 5 to 6 years I believe, so it must have been around 2003 or so, these rounds?How long did a round last anyway?

I do have fond memories of this game though, I wouldn't mind playing it again even though I have absolutely no time at hands

Ahh yes... memories... Hell did it's job remarkably well, though it wasn't designed to stand up to a true raiding force (ie. Fury, SH level raiders), but Legion was never going to attract their attention either. I didn't design it with attrition in mind, I meant for it to -pod- anyone shooting it in a sub-250ish raider, because AI raiders needed to be around that high to be truly effective, and I didn't expect anyone outside the top-tier to build them due to the expense. Seeing as Hell, through the end of TDZK, held the top kill count of any planet, I think it worked out nicely

It's actual fall was hilarious, and I predicted it. I was camping for the weekend (and had already stopped sitting on the planet since I knew it COULD be taken), and would be gone for 3 days. Vegetto was also going to be awol for the weekend, and I told him flat out, "You realize that since both of us will be gone this weekend, Hell is going to get taken right?". Low and behold, look what happened Vegetto took my advice and docked elsewhere, as did his two alts (yes, of the 4 characters in Legion that survived Hell, three of them were him.)

His attitude towards Fury... well, I told him repeatedly that they weren't coming after us at all. He had his own mind about things constantly, his treatment of Cartel wasn't good either (Cartel members were the ONLY members online during the fall of Hell, and they did what they could to save it), and IIRC Cartel dropped us because we didn't do a damned thing to keep Hell standing, and weren't helping them at all. Legion collapsed and I went right back to RC'ing for Fury in the last few weeks.